It happened a little over month ago, but I still have a smile on my face… At the 2010 San Diego Comic-Con, POPGUN 3 won the Eisner Award for Best Anthology.

I said in my happily shocked acceptance speech that everyone who worked on the book basically one about 1/80th of an Eisner — but it was more like 1/95th! Holy smokes.

Below are the fine folks I was too tongue tied and time constrained to thank / congratulate by name back on July 23rd…

Alison Acton, Joshua Agerstrand, Laura Allred, Anjin Anhut, Kris Anka, Amanda Becker, Peter Bergting, Patricio Betteo, Danilo Beyruth, Sam Bosma, Dan Brereton, Olaf Brill, Dennis Brown, Antonio Campo, Dominique Carrier, Celor, Jim Charalampidis, Bobby Clark, Ryan Cody, Dave Collinson, Dave Curd, Tim Daniel, Mike Dawson, Ben DeRosa, Michael Dialynas, JEIK Dion, Juan Doe, Becky Dreistadt, Nathan Edmondson, Ulises Farinas, Ray Fawkes, Gary Fields, Frank Gibson, Vassilis Gogtzilas, Zac Gorman, George Gousis, Paul Grist, Scott Hallett, Jason Hanley, David Hopkins, Jason Ibarra, Joëlle Jones, Joe Keatinge, Janet Kim, Nic Klein, Peter Krause, Edward Kwong, Erik Larsen, Robbie Lawrence, Johann “Ullcer” Leroux, Maximo V. Lorenzo, Thomas Mauer, Dylan McCrae of SatteliteSoda.com, Derek McCulloch, Sam McKenzie, Tara McPherson, Alberto Mielgo, Robb Mommaerts, Paul Montgomery, Chris Moreno, Matt Moylan, Ralph Niese, Anthony Nixon, Josh Parpan, Jeff Powell, Isam Prado, Justin Randall, Stephen Reedy, Jamie S. Rich, Rachelle Rosenberg, David Rubin, Matteo Scalera, Douglas E. Sherwood, Guillaume Singelin, Eric Skillman, ericstephenson, Alisa Stern, Amy Stern, Chris Stevens, Frank Stockton, Andre Szymanowicz, Gregory Titus, Ron Turner, Christian Ward, Daniel Warner, Connor Willumsen, Brian Winkeler, Michael Woods, Derek Yu, K.I. Zachopoulos, Tonci Zonji, Jim Zubkavich, and the fine folks at Image Comics.

I’m so proud to have had the opportunity to work with all of you on the book!

This morning, my alarm went off at 6:45 AM, as I’d set it.

It went off again at 7:00 AM, as I’d also set it.

As I was typing the first sentence of this post, it went off again at 7:45 AM, as I think I set it after not wanting to get up at 7:00 AM.

I’m obviously up now, but the sound of that alarm as I was typing annoyed the hell out of me. Part of the alarm hate is not wanting to wake up until I naturally wake up, sure. Part of it is also that, well, I’m getting ready for a day that doesn’t particularly excite me. (Though swell things are usually sprinkled throughout.)

Sometimes I wonder if the main reason for the hate is the SOUND. I hate the SOUND of my alarm. And I’m on the third sound in two days.

I use my cell phone (Samsung RANT — I always assume it was very popular for the tween set back in 2000, though, as an old man in 2010, it’s kind of ridiculous), and there are ten “melody” choices and ten ringtones. Put down your calculators — that’s TWENTY choices. Melodies include such ditties as “Deep Chill Out,” “Garage in the Backyard,” and “Golden Dream.”

And I loathe them all. At least at 6:45 – 7:45 in the morning. Maybe it’s not the fault of these cheesy factory set ringtones and melodies.

I bet I could download a song or some funny whatsit or whathaveyou, but I don’t want to spend money on this. Bah. The truth probably is that I could download the most awesome of awesome (“Blaze of Glory” by Bon Jovi in case you didn’t know), and I’d end up hating it as much as any of these ringtones and melodies just because it’d become what rustles me from my slumber every day to go to the cubicle mines.

Speaking of which, I should start getting ready before the next alarm strikes…

Is failure a viable option? Apparently direction is involved. Failing upward seems to be quite profitable for some.

Indeed, some magical people to whom the laws of logic and fairness seemingly do not apply fail upward. I’ve been hearing (thinking?) that a lot lately, usually in reference to humans in nicer cars than mine. Cars that they drive to better jobs than mine. Jobs that they successfully fail at in clothes that are both nicerer and betterer than mine.

So, apparently my failing, I mean, just on the occasions I fail (which is not all the time), but, okay, so failure itself  is not the problem — it’s that I just fail in the wrong direction.

This doesn’t make me feel better, though, because I have no sense of direction. I can fail upward to success or downward to… um… my life. But up down, north south — I don’t know which is which. It’s like when people tell me to drive west. Unless I’m right by the ocean — I mean, if the ocean is visible to me — I don’t know which way is west. That part of my brain is not functional.

I need a Failure Garmin GPS. It’ll tell me when I’m failing in the wrong direction. Maybe I’d enter in the address “123 Success Lane.” And if I start failing downward, it’ll recalculate and get me back on track. Unless there’s poor satellite reception. Then I’m just screwed. Then I just have to drive around aimlessly, trying to quell the panic building inside as I just go about willy nilly, no idea if I’m failing in the correct direction. I need that little computer plugged into my car lighter to tell me which way to go.

Because I can’t do it myself. Seriously. I just… I get lost a lot.

Speaking of… where the hell am I?

When my brother, whom I shall call “Patrick” (because that is his name), and I were wee lil’ lads, we took the title to the Hall & Oates song “Maneater” literally. It terrified us. Well, it terrified me. I don’t want to speak for Patrick. He seemed like he was as scared as I was at the concept of a monster that will “chew you up,” but maybe not… Maybe Patrick was just playing along so as not to make his big brother feel embarrassed or shamed for fearing a pop song. I can’t say for sure, but, to my recollection, we both were at least a little afraid, maybe playfully so, of this song…

And meanwhile, our grandma, who was lovingly codenamed by her grandkids “Bobba,” had a creepy (to us anyway) pillow in her basement that was, if I remember correctly, round and kind of shaped like a lion’s face. This wasn’t it, but this is the closest picture of a similar lion-face kinda pillow I could find…

Okay, yeah, so… no. The lion pillow in the picture above is not scary. The real one, in my memory, was a little patchier, with a more angular and ferocious, less sleepy-time design. Still, it was a pillow shaped like a lion’s face. It was on a couch in our Bobba and Granddaddy’s basement.

Patrick and I used to, or, at least, at one point, would use the pillow as a mask and chase each other around, the pillow-masked one being the “Maneater.” Funny, running-around times based upon a pop song and a lion pillow and a couple of weirdo kids.

“Maneater.” Pop song about a lady who can rip a fella’s world apart with her womanly wiles and lady parts? Or a monster with a lion face that literally consumes men, chewing up their flesh? Different, meanings, different contexts… all terrifying.

Indeed, the song still kind of gives me the heebie jeebies. Now, however, in the interest of complete honesty, as I am wont to do in this blog-thing, I find I am afraid of the song for the legitimate lyric-based reasons, as the “Maneater” described, while not a flesh-eating monster as I once believed, is still a frightening being to me… really, a combo of both enters my head when I hear this song… which is more often than you might assume, as I think Hall & Oates are awesome.

Why do I think this? Because it is the truth. Hall & Oates are indeed awesome.

Lots of sportings have been going on lately.

Balls are being kicked into nets in the World Cup; balls were just being bounced and thrown into baskets in the NBA playoffs; and somewhere, even though I’ve seen and heard very little about it, pucks were being hit with sticks in the Stanley Cup.

So much competition. So much sporting. I hear various people yelling and getting excited in the apartments. So many words are written and shouted and chanted about such sports. Passion. Excitement.Passitement.

Earlier today at work, people packed the food court at lunch time, not to eat the lasagna and grilled veggies being served, no, but to watch the World Cup on BOTH of the television sets in there. (The lasagna and veggies were darn tasty, too, though.)

And just moments ago, my roommate was losing his mind in his room, yelling at the screen as the Los Angeles, CA Lakers narrowly defeated the Bostonian Celtics of Boston in the NBA Playoffs. He was more into it than I was into the season finale of CHUCK, which is saying something, as it included a cover of Jon Bon Jovi’s “Blaze of Glory” among other things I love and enjoy.

It’s madness, this sportingly love. And I wish I could be a part of it. Seems like fun, but, as with video games, I just don’t get into sports like I wish I did. People love ‘em, live ‘em, and lovey-love ‘em, and I just… I dunno. I really feel like I’m missing out. Maybe I need to become more competitive. Or excitably in that joyful, fist pumping way. I dunno. I really do wish I could get all fired up like these sporting fans do about the sports and the whatnot.

SPORT!!!!!